Bold solutions for child care are LONG overdue!
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Dear Friend,

Spring is finally here. Flowers are blooming, birds are chirping and if
you’re a parent your child is probably breaking something right now, or
yelling at you while you’re in the bathroom, or asking you for a snack.
Wait, not that snack. Okay, THAT snack but can you please cut off the
crust?

It’s been a year of snack-giving and non-stop question answering. And as
much as we LOVE spending 24 hours a day with our children and dependents,
7 days a week, for an entire year, the truth is we need a break and NOT
just a temporary one. The truth is, things were tough when it came to
childcare way before the pandemic, and if this year has proven anything
(besides the fact that we really need to pat ourselves on the back for not
collectively pulling out our hair and running screaming into the woods)
it’s that we need UNIVERSAL CHILD CARE. And we have an opportunity RIGHT
NOW to demand it by calling for an investment in care infrastructure that
will truly lead our country to the road of recovery. 

[ [link removed] ]**Take a quick moment to take action now!

The Biden-Harris administration recently introduced a new recovery plan
called  the American Jobs Plan which gives $2 trillion dollars to
infrastructure--focusing on rebuilding bridges, upgrading ports, and a
much needed  $25 billion for child care facilities;[1] and coming soon is
the American Family Plan.

Though we understand and value the importance of uplifting physical
infrastructure, there MUST also be investment into our care infrastructure
in these packages. Just like we need to build bridges to drive on to go to
work, we need to build a care infrastructure so parents can go to work,
children can get early education and thrive, and childcare and care
workers are paid living wages!. 

Want proof that childcare is part of our basic infrastructure that gets us
to work just as much as bridges and roads?  A full 32% of all women
between the ages of 25 and 44 were just pushed entirely out of the labor
force, losing much-needed jobs, due to a lack of childcare this past year,
including women who are childcare workers.[ [link removed] ] These are job losses which
have disproportionately impacted Black, indigenous women of color due to
structural racism. 

Building a care infrastructure is both job creating and job sustaining.
Good care jobs are created and parents can go to work. We simply cannot
recover without prioritizing childcare. We need to enable our breadwinners
to get back to work to support their families and we also need to enable
childcare and care workers to earn living wages!

[2]Tell Congress: To recover, we need childcare and investment in care
infrastructure.

Women, particularly women and moms of color, have borne the brunt of this
pandemic, with child care workers and millions of women having been forced
to leave the workforce. The White House itself has noted that 2.3 million
women have been forced out of the labor force. In January alone, 1.4
million fewer mothers of school-aged children were working for pay than
had been in the previous year. [ [link removed] ] Of those who lost their jobs —over
600,000 are Black and 618,000 are Latina. [ [link removed] ]

Investment in care is LONG overdue. Tell your member of Congress  that
childcare MUST be included in the next recovery package!

The pandemic has laid bare the devastating economic and personal costs of
our country’s failure to invest in care or have a care infrastructure. And
women and moms, especially women and moms of color, have taken the most
responsibility for caring for our kids, our sick family members, our aging
relatives and neighbors and supporting the people in our lives with
disabilities; all while sacrificing our own careers and wellbeing in the
process. 

[3]It doesn’t have to be this way. We have a solution. Tell Congress that
any recovery needs to include childcare! 

What exactly are we asking for to be included in this next recovery
package? A comprehensive, federally funded child care system that ensures
all families have access to high-quality, affordable child care that is
available when and where they need it and invests in the education and
compensation of a diverse workforce such as the Child Care for Working
Families Act.

Any reduction in a commitment to this would be a devastating loss for
families, our labor force, and our economy. Decades of underinvestment is
what made the pandemic so disastrous for our communities. And it’s costly
not only for women, moms, and disproportionately women of color and their
families, but costly for our economy overall. For example, “the risk of
mothers leaving the labor force and reducing work hours in order to assume
caretaking responsibilities amounts to $64.5 billion per year in lost
wages and economic activity.”[ [link removed] ] 

→ Here’s that action link again so you can use it and share it to
prioritize childcare
[4][link removed]

In the face of a historic crisis, we have a historic opportunity, to
finally implement the care infrastructure our families have needed for so
long. We cannot let this moment pass us by. Women, moms, children and
families should not be forced to carry the burden of caretaking and job
loss any longer. Let’s build a vibrant future where childcare is a
structural investment for our nation. We know that with your help now, we
can make this future a reality.

Thank you for being part of an unstoppable movement for good in our
nation!

- Nadia, Nina, Kristin, Donna, Elyssa, and the whole
MomsRising.org/MamásConPoder Team

 

References:

[1] [5]"FACT SHEET: The American Jobs Plan"
[2] [ [link removed] ]PDF: THE PANDEMIC, THE ECONOMY, & THE VALUE OF WOMEN’S WORK
[3] "[ [link removed] ]The Employment Situation in February" & "[ [link removed] ]America's Mothers are
in Crisis"
[4] [ [link removed] ]PDF: THE PANDEMIC, THE ECONOMY, & THE VALUE OF WOMEN’S WORK
[5] [ [link removed] ]How COVID-19 Sent Women’s Workforce Progress Backward: Congress’
$64.5 Billion Mistake


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